The Rev. Anthony Hutchinson is the new rector of Trinity Episcopal Church in Ashland, Oregon. Before ordination, he served as a diplomat for the US State Department.
Fresh from 25 years as a U.S. diplomat — most of it on the front lines of international political and cultural interactions in China — the Rev. Anthony Hutchinson was installed Thursday as rector of Trinity Episcopal Church in Ashland.
Hutchinson, 58, who was ordained in the Hong Kong Anglican Church in 2008, took the Ashland post on Jan. 1. He says he brings a church tradition rooted in thoughtfulness and faith, not “bumper-sticker slogans.”
“I bring an international Anglican breadth to the church, a sacramental view,” he says, noting the Episcopal Church is rooted in Protestant and Catholic traditions. “It’s a prayer made manifest.”
From 2009 to 2011, Hutchinson served as assisting pastor and minister of music at the Congregation of the Good Shepherd in Beijing, where his parishioners hailed from a wide spectrum of Christian faiths. He also had served as chaplain at St. John’s Cathedral, and taught biblical languages and literature at Minghua Theological Seminary in Hong Kong.
In the Foreign Service, he specialized in public diplomacy in China and also served in Africa. In China, Hutchinson was a right-hand man for ambassadors, sometimes providing the prayers for the embassy’s solemn occasions, including on the 10th anniversary of 9/11.
He retired in 2011 as a counselor in the Senior Foreign Service, which is equivalent to a one-star general.